Somerset School Committee recount to take place Thursday

A recount to break the deadlocked School Committee race will take place Thursday at 7 p.m. at the public library on County Street, Town Clerk Dolores Berge said. Challenger Melissa Terra, who matched incumbent Chairman Jamison Souza’s 1,276 votes, filed a petition with the necessary 10 registered...

A recount to break the deadlocked School Committee race will take place Thursday at 7 p.m. at the public library on County Street, Town Clerk Dolores Berge said.

Challenger Melissa Terra, who matched incumbent Chairman Jamison Souza’s 1,276 votes, filed a petition with the necessary 10 registered signatures for each of the five precincts and requested the recount, Berge said.

Either candidate could have filed.

The candidates must be given three days of notice on the recount date, and Berge scheduled the recount after notifying them and the Board of Registers to ensure everyone was available, she said.

The library will be open for the recount at 6:30 p.m. Each candidate is allowed two overseers at each of the three counting stations where the registrars will conduct hand counts, Berge said.

She said the last time a town election resulted in a recount was in 1997 when Souza’s mother, Marilyn Souza, tied Marilyn Harris for School Committee. The elder Souza won the race.

While Berge was clearly hoping the deadlock would be broken because of the potential added expense of a special election, she shrugged when asked what might tip the scale for the town’s optical scan system.

“I don’t know. They’re pretty accurate,” Berge said of the system connecting the dark lines for a chosen candidate.

Should the deadlock remain after the recount, the town clerk is required to notify the School Committee “of a failure to elect. It’s in their hands after that,” Berge said.

The tie vote was for one of two School Committee seats being contested. Challenger Lori Rothwell easily topped the field with 1,676 votes – exactly 400 more than Souza and Terra.